Summary: A serious look at Jesus words about his coming from a biblical rather than dispensational perspective.

"Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour (Mat 24:44 NRS).

“I didn’t see it coming!”

Back in September, as the NFL football season just got started, Trent Richardson, former Running Back for the Cleveland Browns, was surprised when he got traded from the Browns to the Colts. “I turned on the radio and all of a sudden I heard,” Richardson told News 19 in Cleveland. “I can’t believe it, I didn’t see it coming from anywhere… I wanted to be a Brown, I didn’t see it coming…. I bought my house here in Cleveland, I’ve been doing a lot of stuff in the community. I’m really shocked, especially for my family who have got to pick up and move. And also for my fans, I know I have a lot of fans behind me….I just didn’t see it coming.” (http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/09/19/trent-richardson-i-cant-believe-it-i-didnt-see-it-coming/).

A Morgan Stanley banker and boss, Ruth Porat, who thought she understood the risks to the financial system, didn’t see the great financial collapse coming in September of 2008. At the time, she was advising the U.S. Treasury about how to rescue Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but then she got the call that her own bank almost vanished. To stay afloat, they had to sell 20% of their holdings, and then the government had to bail them out with a single-day loan of $107 billion dollars. Will another collapse come? If it does, you can bet your bottom dollar, it will happen the same way. No one will see it coming. http://hereisthecity.com/2013/09/10/five-years-on-from-collapse-banks-still-at-risk/.

Do you remember when that meteorite screamed across the Russian sky and rained down fire and debris as it broke apart over the Ural Mountains, injuring nearly 1,000 people. So why didn’t Scientist see this coming? They had an explanation: “Size matters,” said Andrew Cheng, a Johns Hopkins Physicist. “It doesn’t take a very large object. A 10 meter size (feet wide) object already packs the same energy as a nuclear bomb.” The one that crashed in Russia was 15 meters, or 49 feet; entered the Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of 33,000 mph and shattered about 18-32 miles above the ground. It released the energy of several kilotons when it broke apart, but it was relatively small so that it was nearly impossible to track. “While Scientist scan the heavens frequently and keep track of millions of objects,” Cheng said, “they don’t keep watch continually.” http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/02/15/russian-meteorite-why-didnt-scientists-see-it-coming/.

We haven’t experienced the crash of meteors in the Yadkin Valley---but most all of us have been there, or will be there when something happens that we didn’t see coming. A Rock Band known as Belle and Sabastian even has a song about it: “I didn’t see it coming….” Over and over the truth keeps coming, and in our text today Jesus reminds us too: “Be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour….” It’s the same truth. You had better be ready, for when it happens no one will see it coming.